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Goliarda Sapienza

Biography

Sapienza’s writing includes short stories, novels, and poetry. Many of her works are still unpublished. Her own life experiences are at the core of her production, yet it would not be correct to label all she wrote as 'autobiography'. In her masterpiece L’arte della gioia, Sapienza skillfully transforms her own story into an original narration, the heroine of which is a Cinderella who earns for herself the real title of Princess.

Goliarda Sapienza was born in Catania in 1924. Her mother was Maria Giudice, a well-known socialist, journalist, and antifascist, who had spent several years rallying rural areas in Lombardy to help and educate farmers and workers. Later Maria, widowed and with her children (born from her 'free union' with the anarchist Carlo Civardi), settled in Catania with Peppino Sapienza, 'the lawyer of the poor'. Goliarda was born from their union.

Life in the Sapienza-Giudice household was permeated by political activism, so it was mostly her brother Ivanoe who took care of little Goliarda. Her attendance of regular public schools was cut short by her father, who did not agree with the Fascist education philosophy and could not stand seeing his daughter wearing a Fascist uniform to go to school. Freed from regular school routine, the world around her became school.

Ultimately, in the 1930s, although she was living in one of the least desirable quarters in Catania, and in the backward society of Sicily, Goliarda spent her childhood and first years of adolescence having unique experiences. She learned from artisans how to weave chairs and sew costumes for the marionettes of the traditional Opera de’ Pupi. At the same time she was privately tutored, learned to play the piano, and went frequently to the cinema. Reenacting the plots of films she had seen, playing all the characters in front of families and friends was what she did best and enjoyed.

Having reached puberty, Goliarda’s freedom was restricted, and roaming free in the streets of Catania, was substituted with spending more time at home with her friends. Nonetheless, Goliarda's unique education enhanced her natural theatrical skills, which were well recognized by both her family and the people in her neighbourhood. In 1941, at the age of sixteen, Goliarda left for Rome with her mother, to study theatre at the Reale Accademia d’Arte Drammatica (Royal Academy of Dramatic Art). Like most other Italians, Goliarda’s life was heavily affected by the war. Following her family’s political tradition, she became heavily involved with the partigiani’s actions. After the war she returned to theatre and started acting and working in cinema. In 1947, her long relationship with director Citto Maselli started, lasting until 1965.

The excitement of acting and working in cinema seemed to fade as Goliarda grew older and, in 1958, writing became her main occupation. During the following years, writing also coincided with facing unresolved issues of her adolescence. She reveals her inner conflicts through the narrative in Lettera aperta (1967) and Il filo di mezzogiorno (1969). For having stolen a friend’s jewels she even spent a few days in the Roman women’s prison Rebibbia, and this unique experience inspired L’università di Rebibbia (1983) and Le certezze del dubbio (1987). Her masterpiece L’arte della gioia was posthumously published in its entirety only in 1998 by Angelo Pellegrino, to whom she was married for the last seventeen years of her life.

Goliarda Sapienza died in Gaeta in August 1996. Other posthumously-published works include Destino coatto (2002), and Io, Jean Gabin (2009). The list of Sapienza's unpublished works, letters, and diaries is still quite long.